Figure 4.

P. falciparum conditioned medium induces disruption of the endothelial barrier by reducing β-catenin and ZO-1 expression. Sub-confluent BMEC monolayers, cultivated in coverslips, were pretreated or not with 10⁻⁷ M HOE140, for 30 min, before overnight incubation with 20% Plasmodium falciparum conditioned medium (CM) (A) or 10⁻⁷ M BK (B). The next day, cells were washed and prepared for immunofluorescence as described in Materials and Methods section. Representative photomicrographs of ZO-1 (green), β-catenin (red), DAPI (Blue), and merged channels are shown. Magnification = 630x, Scale bar = 20 μm. The figures are representative of three independent experiments with different cell suspensions. At least three different slides were prepared for each experimental condition and at least five fields per slide, randomly chosen, were analyzed.